Sword & Trowel 2018: Issue 2


 but this does not mean we should take advantage of it by not prepar-


ing our hearts and being ready for a mighty and privileged encounter with the living God. Surely we learn from the sacrifi ces of old that God requires a prepared and orderly ap- proach, and a thoughtful approach. It is by the astonishing kindness of God that we go to him through Calvary; through the eternal Son of God. As you go, see him slain for you, and see in your mind his Calvary work rather as you would have seen the bullock, the sheep, the goat, the turtle dove, or the pigeon slain. Pray that the Lord may bring it home to your heart with fresh reality. Feel that you have done it to him. Refl ect as Paul Gerhardt did in his hymn —


Extended on a cursèd tree, Besmeared with dust, and sweat, and blood,


See there, the King of glory see! Sinks and expires the Son of God.


Who, who, my Saviour, this has done? Who would Thy sacred body wound?


No guilt Thy spotless heart has known, No guile has in Thy lips been found.


I, I alone, have done the deed! ’Tis I Thy sacred flesh have torn;


My sins have caused Thee, Lord, to bleed, Pointed the nail, and fi xed the thorn.


Too much to Thee I cannot give; Too much I cannot do for Thee;


Let all Thy love, and all Thy grief, Grav’n on my heart for ever be!


Still let Thy tears, Thy groans, Thy sighs, O’erfl ow my eyes, and move my breast,


Till loosed from fl esh and earth I rise, And ever in Thy presence rest.


Refl ect on the cost to Christ, the magnitude of his agonies and the necessity of his atoning death. Take a ‘meal offering’ by taking Christ for your perfect righteousness, and long to be worthy of him. And take up your priesthood because we are a kingdom of priests, and where the priest took the portions of the animal and put them on the altar to burn, we make known Christ. We present him to people, we pray for them, and we do the work of the priest in bringing them to Calvary. Summon all sincerity. These were


freewill voluntary acts even in ancient times. The offering was your own, from your own herd, purchased with your own money. Christ has done everything for us. But there is a sense in which worship must be costly. It must cost us our concentration and all our hearts. So this is why we have called this refl ection, ‘true repentance for believers’.


Metropolitan Tabernacle Sunday Services 11.00am (teaching service)


and 6.30pm (evangelistic service) – sign language interpreting at all public services, and simultaneous interpretation into Spanish, French, Chinese, Farsi and Arabic.


Children’s Sunday Schools and Teenagers’ Bible Classes at the Tabernacle (and at Surrey Gardens Memorial Hall, Surrey Square Mission,


East Dulwich Tabernacle, and Minet Road Branch) 3.00pm. College Classes and Young Adults’ Doctrine Class 3.15pm.


Main Prayer Meeting, Monday 7.30pm. Bible Study, Wednesday 7.30pm.


Deaf Fellowship Meetings, weeknight meetings for the young, and other ministries are posted on the Tabernacle website: www.MetropolitanTabernacle.org


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